


Gone and Never Coming Back

by virmillion



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Gen, Nightmares, car crash, its a plot point tbh, the major character death happened pre story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-06-27
Packaged: 2019-08-19 21:54:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16542989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/virmillion/pseuds/virmillion
Summary: alternative title: patton learns how to cope with loss by being tossed directly into the deep end with three sets of ankle weights





	Gone and Never Coming Back

Patton hates this. He  _ hates  _ it. He hates how much effort it takes to scowl at the sky, full of puffy white clouds and brilliantly bright sunshine. He hates how hard it is to muster any emotions, any reactions,  _ anything _ , beyond this horrible emptiness. He hates it.

This is nothing like how it’s supposed to be. He’s seen the movies, he knows the pattern, so why isn’t the world following suit? Heart-wrenching tragedy amidst angry storm clouds and melancholy birdsong. That’s what he’s supposed to get. Not sunny skies. Not happy animal noises. Not emptiness. Not this. Patton falls to his knees, feeling the last drops of dew soaking his pants. Even that isn’t enough to fill the chasm, without so much as a gentle breeze to send stabbing pinpricks of cold through his body. No, just this perfectly pleasant warmth and inescapable complacency. Patton flinches as a soft voice enters the not quite silent area. He wishes it could be total silence, so he would have a reason to jerk away, a reason to hate the speaker for daring to intrude upon his pain.

“I didn’t know him long,” they say. Their voice hitches on the  _ him _ , pulling like a stubborn thread where the rest of the rope has already been cut. They swallow, blink, continue. “The only reason I ever had the chance to meet Virgil was—was because of—I’m sorry, I just, I can’t.” Their voice lowers to a broken whisper. “I can’t do it, Logan.”

Patton wants to be angry, wants to demand the person continue, how  _ dare _ they pity themselves when someone so important was ripped away without so much as a second thought, but he can’t. All he can do is plead with his own mouth to open, to taste how disgustingly fresh the air is, to breathe in the obscenely clean atmosphere. Someone else steps up, wrapping an arm around the speaker’s shoulders. The pair goes stiff, blocking Patton’s view, but did he ever really want to look in the first place? He should be looking. He should be making himself take in everything, absorb the entire world in a way Virgil would never be able to. Not anymore.

“For Virgil,” the newcomer, Logan, murmurs. “For Virgil, and for Patton, and for you, Roman. I’ll try.” He squeezes Roman’s shoulder, straightening his glasses in a way that the reflected light would blind Patton, could he bring himself to look up. “Virgil was amazing. He always cracked in with a facetious remark, or a rude comment, but when it came down to it, he really cared about us.” Logan’s head turns, probably to look at the larger plot marked with a capital  _ T _ . “All of us.”

At that, Patton feels the waterworks of his insides attempt to start up. Attempt to. He feels the familiar burn in his eyes, the catch in his throat, the shuddering, ragged heaving in his lungs, but that’s it. The tears don’t come. His best friend is gone and he can’t bring himself to shed so much as a single drop of salt water in his name. Patton hates this so, so much. The horribly hot sun glows so bright, distracting him, yanking his attention away from the grass, the dirt, the shovels, the perfectly carved oak below the carefully selected marble  _ V _ . Virgil always used to joke about how precise his funeral would be, that he’d be anal to the point of rising from the grave to dictate exactly what would happen. Nothing rises from the dirt but roses and daisies and dandelions, all ready to kiss the sunlight, all ready to mock Patton’s misery.

“Patton. Time to go.” Something comes to rest on Patton’s shoulder, ripping him out of his spiral. Roman gazes down at him, a half-smile on his face. “They need to close up the cemetery, and you need to get home.” The smile is betrayed by the obvious tears glistening at the rims of his eyes. Logan approaches from the other side, extending a hand to help Patton to his feet. Patton hesitates, feeling his shoulders droop, his knuckles drag over the dried dirt. Not even the sky could have bothered to offer its tears today.

Two hands guide him to the blue car waiting at the entrance, one on either side, both centered around the small of his back. Patton sees the earth racing by under his tennis shoes, but he doesn’t feel it. Not really. The world is still cheerfully spinning on, as if the last week had never happened. The bottomless pit forming in his gut doesn’t even hurt, and that’s the worst part. Patton can’t bring himself to feel anything, when this is the most pain he should be experiencing in his life. It should have been him gone, and Virgil would be fine, and Thomas would be fine, and everyone could move on without him because he was undoubtedly just going to drag everyone down instead of lifting them up like always and—

“Hey, hey, look at me. Look at me.” Roman gently takes his chin, forcing Patton’s eyes to meet his. “I know what you’re thinking. I’m thinking it too, but we can’t go down that road. Not now, not ever. It wasn’t our fault, and I need you to know that.” Logan gives a nearly imperceptible nod, his attention focused on the crushed grass beneath their feet. “I need you to believe me. I can’t promise that it’s going to be okay, but I can promise we’ll be here for you. If you need us, we will be here.” With that, a painfully long, painfully silent, painfully painless car ride awaits.

 

\---------

 

“In other recent news, we come to you live from outside this gas station, where only moments ago, a horrific—”

“Nope,” Logan says, clicking the remote to change the channel. “We are not wallowing in these things, and I am deleting this from the DVR. There is no reason for you to have it saved.”

“He just wanted to help Thomas,” Patton murmurs, his eyes glued to the flickering screen. “We owe him enough to see his last moments, when we couldn’t have been there. I should have been there. If I had left ten seconds sooner—”

“Then it would have been you behind the wheel, and your skull caved in by Thomas’ arm. What’s done is done, and we have to accept that.” Logan lowers himself beside Patton on the couch, awkwardly patting his knee. “There’s nothing we can do about it now, except fight through the rain to see the sun again.” Neglecting to comment on the utter lack of rain, Patton draws his knees to his chest.

“Maybe the sun is just there to bide the time until the rain comes back, and the clouds are just the natural way of the world.” Patton buries his face in his knees, hating the complete lack of moisture being transferred from one to the other. “Maybe there’s a burning ball of fire in the sky, and even that has more feeling than me at this point. That doesn’t change that I could have done something, that I could have been there, that it’s my—”

“Virgil is dead, Patton.” Logan’s voice slices through the room with all the efficiency of a guillotine pitted against empty air. “Roman and I are going to go home now, but don’t do something you’ll regret. We’re just a phone call away.”

Left alone with the babbling noises of some cartoon on the television, Patton absorbs the emptiness into himself. He huddles tighter in, his eyes darting around every object on every shelf. The sun sinks lower beneath the horizon outside, taking with it the last warmth of the day. Maybe the last warmth of any day, forever. The last warmth of a time when Patton would be within five feet of Virgil, which would never happen again, because Virgil is gone and Patton can’t reach him and no one else will ever know just how much it hurts because Patton is alone.

The realization slams into him like a truck, but no, that’s not quite right. It’s worse, because Patton already knew he was alone. It’s more like a snowball built around an ice cube thrown by a vindictive toddler. Cold and hard and he almost wants to laugh at how ridiculous it is, because there’s nothing left to feel so he may as well find the humor in the situation from which he wants only to escape.

Finally, despite not having reached his fill of self pity, Patton lets his eyes come to rest on the collection of Funko pop figurines. Such a dedication of Virgil’s, to find the coolest ones and line them up in color order to give the room a good aesthetic. Patton never quite got that, but it made Virgil happy, which is all the worse now that no one will derive any pleasure from it. Resting against that stack of toys, a purple and grey skateboard. One of Virgil’s prized possessions, something he was so proud of having learned to maneuver. Now it will sit there, unused, forever. Moving on, to that pile of dirty clothes lying in the corner. Mostly hoodies, for Virgil to grab at his leisure before any outing. Never to be worn again. The distant sound of a scratchy meow—Virgil’s cat, Tyrone, now missing an owner. Patton feels his blackened heart sinking deeper and deeper with each trinket and memory, his breath failing him when he sees the picture.

Propped against a jar of incense, the stained oak frame barely catches any light, drawing attention to the photo it holds. Virgil, a rare smile peeking out from under that hoodie, holding up a struggling Tyrone. It’s only fantasy, but Patton almost thinks he can see himself smiling back in the reflection of his pupils. Almost.

And then the doorbell rings.

 

\---------

 

Patton feels his shirt draping in heavy folds over his thin frame. He hears the sound of his socked feet scraping over the carpet. He smells the burnt cookies, yanked from the oven by Logan when they were forgotten in lieu of getting to Virgil. He tastes the old saliva on his tongue, empty of any flavor but hopelessness. He sees the front door, looming closer, like a towering void of lost faith. The last person to use this door was Virgil. He can’t use this door. He can’t. That wouldn’t be right. This door is the last standing monument to honor Virgil’s final actions involving this house. Patton cannot do it. He cannot open that door.

The doorbell rings again.

The world zeroes in, pinholing into a tunnel before his eyes, each of his senses tracing whatever lies beyond that door. Everything is numb. No one uses the front door except Virgil, because he refused to go through the garage. Refused to drive anywhere, because of how dangerous roads could be. Even getting in a car, he had to use the front door. Tradition, even in spite of his fear. Once bitten, but he never had the chance to be shy.

The doorbell rings again.

Every last drop of Patton’s effort goes into raising his arm, shifting around the proper muscles, stretching his fingers to fit the curvature of the door handle. The cool metal bites into his skin, so unused for so long, and the soft clicks as it turns sound like Virgil. They sound like home. The tears finally come, having crept out of their hidden caverns, having shown themselves, having announced their presence before beginning a careful pilgrimage from Patton’s eyes to his chin. When a clear droplet splatters against his sock, he finally remembers why he’s frozen at the door. His vision blurred, Patton opens the door. He can’t see who stands beyond it, but he can certainly feel the suffocating hug they wrap him in. Almost like a ghost, impossibly tight and pleading, but not entirely there. Not entirely real.

Patton’s nerve endings jerk at the familiarly unfamiliar sensations. The careful dig of bitten-down fingernails prying at the fabric of his shirt. The way his collar twists to choke his neck, not enough to hurt, but enough to be noticed. The way his shoulders squeeze together, wrapped up in someone else’s arms. The way a few strands of hair tickle at his earlobe. The way a hood comes to rest on his wrists, once he finally gathers himself enough to hug them back. The telltale wet drops on his shoulder, undeniably tears. The ragged breathing on his neck, sending shivers down his spine. Most of all, best of all, worst of all, least possible of all, that same garbled scent of laundry detergent stained with vanilla. The word passes Patton’s lips before he fully realizes its implications.

“Virgil?”

“Patton.”

The embrace lasts millenia, seconds, eons, moments. It’s over all at once. It’s over in the space between breaths. It’s over in the millimeters separating one person’s heart from the next. It’s over in the gaps between firing synapses. It’s over in the chasm of an empty week, with hope and love shoved into the corner to make room for loss and despair. It’s over when the world has come crashing down around Patton’s ears and everything he’s ever known has washed away, lost to a swirling void that used to be memories.

Patton isn’t quite sure when it happens, but at some point, he feels his arms rise, his hands flex, his body pushing itself away. His fingers drift up, coming to rest on the shoulders of a stranger, a family member, a friend, somebody, nobody. It takes effort, so much effort, a painful amount of effort, for Patton to shift his focus. From the black and purple hoodie, to the neutral scowl on the lips, to the pink ears under his scrutiny, to the crooked nose, broken from a skateboard injury, to the sagging dark bags under the eyes. To the eyes. To the brown eyes. To the warm, brown eyes. To the warm, watering brown eyes. To the warm, watering, terrified brown eyes. To the warm, watering, terrified, searching, pleading, begging brown eyes. To Virgil’s eyes.

“This isn’t possible,” Patton murmurs. Virgil cracks a half smile, shaking his head. His bangs fall, obscuring those brown eyes. Unconsciously, Patton’s fingers move to brush them aside, flinching back at the last moment.  _ Not possible. _

“I’m not a vampire, but it would be nice if you could invite me in.” Virgil’s voice is a low, husky, breathy stream of words. It doesn’t vibrate air molecules—no, no, the air parts to the sides, making way for Virgil to speak. The air wouldn’t dare get in the way of this. “It’s been a little while, huh?” Even the faint breeze, ruffling the leaves scattered across the ground, even that little draft goes still, waiting alongside Patton with bated breath to understand, to hear more, to listen, to believe.

“You’re supposed to be—” Patton can’t make himself say it. He can’t force his mouth to form the words, he can’t do it, his tongue weighs millions of pounds, his jaw is wired shut, everything is too heavy and too massive and too much and he can feel the weight of the world dragging him down into the deepest pits of hell because he  _ can’t _ .

“Inside? Yeah, probably.” Virgil’s laugh doesn’t sound like the ringing bells outside the Notre Dame Cathedral. It doesn’t sound like angels singing above puffy white clouds against a pink and yellow sky. It doesn’t sound like anything described in any of those silly little books with their silly little problems or their silly little fantasies, because those aren’t real. Nothing is real, to tell the truth. Virgil’s laugh sounds only like the tired laugh of someone who’s seen too much, and Patton’s face remains unchanged from its mask of shock and lack of understanding. This is reality, and Patton has no idea how to cope with it.

Virgil slips past Patton, giving his shoulder a final squeeze before making a beeline for the couch. Even as a mound of blankets forms, distinguished only by the eyes tracking the characters on the television, Patton doesn’t move. He remains there, feeling how his feet have sunken into the carpet, feeling his motionless fingers tingle all the way to the tips, feeling his heart pounding in his stomach. His eyes blur, going out of focus like a camera zoomed in too far, his mind processing more than his chest can handle. It’s when a stray gust of wind bats the strings of his waistband up, barely tickling his skin, that he remembers he exists. It feels real.

Surrounded by a fog of numbness, Patton finds his way back to the couch, where Virgil tosses an arm around him, yanking him under the blankets. Maybe it’s hours, or days, or even weeks, that Patton spends under the cave of fabrics, but he doesn’t really mind. It’s not warm, or cold, or even quite right, but it’s happening. He feels his mind shifting, morphing, changing to accept this new reality. At one point, he gets it in his mind to check the DVR, to see if last week was a bad dream. Maybe so, as the news recording is gone. No evidence of Virgil’s accident.

Tyrone presents himself a few hours into the mindless television marathon, taking a position between Virgil and Patton. He curls his striped brown tail around Patton’s arm, which only makes the confusion worse. Where the fur sends up goosebumps, rising hairs from the contact, the pressure of Virgil’s arm does nothing of the sort. It’s almost a dead weight, if dead weights could levitate inches above air while sinking through skin at the same time. Patton ignores it.

 

\---------

 

Patton knows it’s a dream when he sees the gas station. He knows it’s a dream when he sees Tyrone’s tail poking out of the gas pump. He knows it’s a dream when he can’t smell the spilled gasoline on the street corner. He knows it’s a dream when all the sidewalks empty of people, all at once. He knows it’s a dream when he sees the grey car rolling up. He knows it’s a dream when he sees Virgil’s face, already set in a grimace. He knows it’s a dream when he hears the screeching tires blowing through the red light. He knows it's a dream, but that doesn’t mean he can wake himself up.

The grey car is almost through the intersection. Almost. Not close enough to miss the car careening into the passenger side. Not close enough for Thomas to be able to lean away, despite how ineffective it might be. Not close enough for Thomas to lower his arm, waving around to emphasize some point or another. Not close enough for Patton to open his mouth, to call out a warning, to plead for consciousness. Not close enough for the flying elbow to stop its momentum. Not close enough for the red car to veer to the side. Not close enough for the driver of the red car to throw up their hands. Not close enough for Virgil to duck. Not close enough. Not close enough. Not close enough.

Patton blinks, and it’s already over. The grey car is smoking. Virgil isn’t moving. Thomas is leaning forward, coughing, sobbing, broken and ragged screams pouring from his gaping mouth. Virgil isn’t moving. Thomas opens his mouth wider, wider, ripping his cheeks apart, his tongue splitting down the middle, shooting two octaves of pain into the sky, tearing his face to shreds. Virgil isn’t moving. The sirens are coming, nowhere near fast enough, nowhere near loud enough to drown out the cries and shouts and dialing phones. Virgil isn’t moving. Virgil isn’t moving. Virgil isn’t moving.

And Patton, in all his unending selfishness, in all his despicable stillness, Patton doesn’t cry. He doesn’t speak. He isn’t moving. Virgil isn’t moving. Patton is drowning.

 

\---------

 

Patton wakes to an empty room. The television has shifted to a silent screensaver, the mound of blankets is still suffocating him, and a familiar lump sits beside him. He stretches out a hesitant hand to brush the aside, but the only thing beneath them is Tyrone. The cat meows at him, stretches out its paws, yawns, and jumps nimbly from the couch. It twines around his legs, rubbing its face along the shelf holding Virgil’s Funko pops. Patton hardly notices, preoccupied with staring at the empty space on the couch.

“He was right there,” Patton murmurs. He doesn’t even blink when he hears footsteps approach.

“You okay, buddy?” Roman leans over the back of the couch, his voice in a carefully gentle tone so as not to disturb Patton. “You weren’t answering your door, and we rang the bell a couple times.”

“He was right there,” Patton repeats. It’s almost a mantra, now, to say it. To know that despite everything, despite what happened, despite what never happened, he can manage this one simple task. “He was right there. He was right there. He was right there.”

Tyrone meows, purring as Logan scratches the scruff of his neck. Roman makes some comment about taking allergy medicine, but Patton doesn’t hear it, not really. He only hears his own voice, repeating, tripping over the words, clinging to the last certainty he can bring himself to believe. “He was right there. He was right there. He thus white hair. He was right there. He was thight where. He was rife tear. He was right there.”

“Patton? Can you look at me?” Patton’s eyes might move to look at Roman—he isn’t sure, not really. He doesn’t know anything beyond  _ he was right there. _

“Patton, it’s been days, have you eaten anything?” This from Logan, whose eyes brim with concern and confusion at Patton’s new catchphrase.  _ He was right there. _ “Don’t answer that, I’ll go make you some food. Starving yourself won’t help anyone.”

“I’ll stay with him,” Roman calls to Logan’s retreating form. He turns back to Patton, who hasn’t stopped his mantra. It’s not reassuring, per se, but it’s something. It’s one thing that he can hold on to, can stake his life on, because as of right now, he isn’t even sure whether he’s imagining Roman.

“He was right there.”

Roman rubs the back of his own neck, biting his lip. “I can’t very well help you if you don’t uncurl from your little ball of solitude.”

“He was right there.”

“Patton, is there anything else we can do for you? I just want to help you, but you need to work with me on this.”

“He was right there.”

Huffing a sigh, Roman lets his head hang low. “I know. He was right there. I get it. What matters isn’t the  _ was _ . What matters is right now, and you, and your health and safety, which I want to ensure. That’s what we need to be focusing on.”

Something in Patton finally quakes at that. He feels his body sparking, lighting up, the dams breaking at the back of his throat as everything finally breaks loose, with no barriers to hold it back. He doesn’t even think to cover his mouth, what with his hands shaking so much that they might as well be a blurring haze of nothingness to blind him from what may or may not be happening, what already happened, what never happened. Does it really matter anymore?

“He was right there, and you can’t even bother to ask me what I’m talking about because all you seem to care about is the after part, when everything is said and done and there’s no escaping it, but what about the then? What about what already happened? What about Virgil, and Thomas, and what we can’t get back? What about Virgil, who’s lying six feet under in a grave because he’s dead and there’s no getting him back, not now, not ever?” Patton inhales, a broken, aching sound, the sharp jabs of air forcing their way through his nose.

His jaw trembling, he lifts his eyes to stare at the front door.

No one will ever walk through that again.

He feels the tears finally trekking down his face.

He feels the snot pouring down in a messy flood.

He feels the spit bubbles forming when his mouth forces itself to open.

He feels his heart finally collapsing like an exploding star.

And Patton sobs, because Virgil is dead.

He feels everything come to a halt.

Not a screeching halt.

Not a silent halt.

But a permanent halt.

Virgil is dead.

And there is nothing he can do about it.

“He’s dead.” The words barely make it past Patton’s lips before Roman tries to lay a hand on his shoulder. Patton whips around to bare his teeth, his eyebrows knitted in a mishmash of wrinkled skin and seething despair. “He’s  _ dead. _ ” Patton shakes the hand of, flecks of spit flying from his teeth to land on Roman’s horrifyingly perfect, obnoxiously porcelain face.

“Hey, listen, it’s okay—”

“It’s not okay, so stop  _ lying _ to me.” Patton is choking for air, for one breath, for anything, but he doesn’t care anymore. Tyrone cowers by the shelf, its tail flickering in concern. Patton hurls a blanket at the wall above the cat, sending it flying up the stairs. “Virgil is  _ dead _ , and we’re never getting him back!”

Patton doesn’t see Logan freeze in the kitchen, a spatula poised in the air. Patton doesn’t see Roman’s glass face, seconds away from shattering. Patton doesn’t see the stairs tumbling under his feet as he chases the stupid cat with its stupid hisses and its stupid cries and its stupid padding feet as it curls up in the corner of Virgil’s bedroom to escape Patton’s boundless rage.  _ He was right there and now he’s dead. _

A discussion might happen behind the door he slams shut, Patton isn’t sure. All he knows is the sound of the cat’s hesitant meows, the feeling of its fur driving an allergic reaction, the complete and utter hopelessness as he gives up. Patton’s vision stays blurry, and his jaw is still quivering, and he’s surrounded by memories and scents and sights that all invoke what used to be his closest friend who’s now dead and gone and never coming back. His inhales still come, sharp and heavy and painful, as the house falls nearly silent. Roman and Logan continue talking in low voices outside, but it must be hours later when they finally conclude that they aren’t getting Patton out of Virgil’s room.

Virgil is gone.

Virgil isn’t coming back.

Patton finally breaks.

Patton finally lets himself cry.

But most of all, Patton exhales.


End file.
